The It Girl by Ruth Ware: A Mystery Review

review

After a brief sabbatical from thriller/mystery author Ruth Ware, who is one of my favorites, this has been one of my most highly-anticipated releases of 2022. Unfortunately, The It Girl fell a little flat for me. As a book her editor touted as “her best work yet,” I’m disappointed.

That’s not to say this wasn’t an excellent book. It had me hooked from the beginning, but billing it as a thriller isn’t accurate in my opinion. This is more of a mystery novel, with the thrilling moments not coming nearly early or often enough for my liking.

That said, I really liked Hannah as our narrator, and the nonlinear timeline was an adventure. It went between ten years ago leading up to the moment Hannah found her roommate April dead, and now as the man who was convicted of her murder has died. I found myself picking apart every little interaction between each of the characters, looking for signs that would point me in the direction of April’s killer.

I’m happy to announce that I did NOT see that one coming. When the big reveal happened, I even went back and reread the moments leading up to the murder and still couldn’t figure it out.

in conclusion

In terms of creep factor, it was a one out of five for me. But the storyline was well-developed, the characters dynamic and perfectly fleshed out, providing a myriad of suspects in this latest whodunit from Ware. Overall I give it four stars, and I recommend giving it a chance and forming your own opinions!